I was wondering why Marxism was still a thing and this placed seemed to be filled with Marxists. So, why? Didn’t the fall of USSR teach us anything? Do today’s Marxists think that USSR did something wrong? In other words, will they do anything different than the dictators of the soviet union? Also, some here seem to admire Stalin. I would really have to try hard to find a community that would admire Hitler but apparently admiring Stalin, another mass murder seems to be perfectly fine!
Let’s not sugar coat the Soviet Union, though. While it had its upsides, it was riddled with corruption and brutally oppressive towards its own people. Dissent that it is considered healthy in the West was grounds for imprisonment there. This is not some fiction cooked up by the West, but a reality acknowledged by modern Russia itself (with some irony, given the sanitized political/media landscape).
We can discuss the validity of those claims all day, but I think the fact that the majority of people who lived through the USSR want it back, and think things have gotten worse after the transition of capitalism speaks volumes.
Source on the claim that most people from those countries want it back?
Did the citizens of the Soviet Union dislike their government?
(From here, compiled by Dessalines.)
That’s very interesting thank you.
US today has a higher incarceration rate than USSR did under Stalin, but do go on.
US has a higher incarceration rate then any developed country. And…most of those jailed are poor and committed non violent crimes…just to add to your statement.
US basically legalized slavery. This is the same logic as legalizing bribes in form of lobbying and then claiming that you have low corruption.
Yeah, and that’s awful, but US prisons aren’t full of political prisoners.
Of course they are, go read up on the war on drugs.
I do know about that history, but it doesn’t come close to being able to chuck someone in prison for publishing something the Communist Party didn’t like.
That’s literally what US government did to Black Panthers members. One of the goals of war on drugs was to provide an excuse for arresting political dissidents of color. They also assassinated people such as MLK and Fred Hampton for saying things US government didn’t like. Perhaps you should learn a bit of history before debating?
You can start by reading chapter 10 here to learn about repression of political dissent and political prisoners in US.
I agree, but that doesn’t refute this answer in the context of the original question.
Stalin’s reign (and other USSR leaders) objectively had many benefits to the people, despite its flaws, and the switch to a capitalist economy afterward has resulted in massive issues. Even thought that’s only one interpretation of Marxism (“Marxist-Leninism”), that enough is a reason for many people to support it.
Well that’s the thing, I’m not sure blaming it all on capitalism is appropriate. Also, many of the claims are incorrect or misleading.
This source does a direct rebuttal of three points from a green text version of this image. This image does not contain one of the claims, but the other two are:
Good critique, I’ll have a read of them. Thanks.
Well when 90% of the countries are capitalist, where do you expect most of the world’s inventions to come from? Should they boycott most of the world over some meaningless idealism? That’s like saying “NASA adopted technologies from the Nazis” (Operation Paperclip) as if that’s a meaningful critique.
But it seems concerning that the places that invented those technologies weren’t as effective in using them, shouldn’t they have an advantage?
It was kind of a cheap jab, I admit. Still, my underlying point stands: their productivity gains were from adopting technology produced by others, so crediting them to communism at least needs a footnote. That’s especially true because of how much growth leveled off when the easy gains stopped.
Also, the countries that invented tractors were plenty good at using them. Witness the US’s endless seas of grains, corn, and other crops. Any food insecurity in the US (or the world, for that matter) is due to distribution, not abundance.